The case of transgender Catholic school teacher Mark Krolikowski: Keeping the faith while gender notions evolve

Mark Krolikowski wore his hair at shoulder length, his nails long and well manicured, and his ears pierced. His appearance, … Continued

by Jim Fitzgerald

Mark Krolikowski wore his hair at shoulder length, his nails long and well manicured, and his ears pierced. His appearance, which evolved over the 32 years he’d spent teaching at St. Francis Preparatory School in Queens, had always been considered a bit unconventional for a Catholic school teacher, but it had caused no problems until October 2011 when the parent of a freshman student complained, setting in motion a series of events that culminated in Krolikowski’s dismissal.

The former teacher says he was laid off because he informed school officials that he was transgender. He has filed suit. The school’s attorney says Krolikowski was fired for “nondiscriminatory reasons.”

The acronym LGBT has entered into common use in recent years, as a quick way of referring to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. But even individuals who are L, G and B don’t always know much about those who are T. As Christians we believe that the church must work to dispel this ignorance, and to support this deeply stigmatized population.

Discrimination against transgender people is pervasive. Like Mark, 47 percent of those who responded to the survey said that they had suffered employment discrimination. Nineteen percent had suffered housing discrimination and a similar number had been denied health care due to their gender identity.

As Catholics, we regret that the leaders of our church and other conservative Christian organizations are leading the fight to deny transgender people their full human dignity and equal treatment under the law. In a recent address, Pope Benedict XVI argued against the very concept of gender, saying that one’s sexual identity is determined entirely by one’s biology.

The pope’s position is not universally shared by Catholics or by other people of faith. The Rev. Cameron Partridge, a leading transgender theologian and the Episcopal chaplain at Boston University, has written that much of the church has “come to accept that God made us in more varieties than typical ‘masculine’ males and ‘feminine’ females who are to be paired only in ‘opposite’ gender couples. This insight helps us understand how we are created as part of a sexual/gender spectrum: people who marry people of the “opposite” sex; people who do not marry, including celibate religious; women who never give birth, by choice or necessity; people whose expressions of gender exceed the norms of their cultures; people born with a combination of female and male bodily traits; gay, lesbian or bisexual people; transgender people.”

Whatever their beliefs about human sexuality, members of the pope’s own church in this country reject discrimination against transgender people. A 2011 poll by the Public Religion Research Institute found that 93 percent of U. S. Catholics believed that transgender people deserve the same legal rights and protections as other citizens. The survey also found that approximately three-quarters of Americans-from across the political and religious spectrum-believe that Congress should pass employment nondiscrimination laws to protect transgender people. A similar majority favor Congress’s recent expansion of hate crimes legislation to protect transgender people.

The U. S. Catholic bishops, on the other hand, have steadfastly opposed laws that extend legal protections to lesbian, gay bisexual and transgender people.

Mark’s case is one of many in which the church’s teaching on the inherent worth and dignity of every individual runs into the stone wall of its pre-modern teachings on human sexuality.

But ordinary Catholics, like Mark’s current and former students, see beyond the bishops’ limited view. They have begun a petition drive on his behalf, and praised him effusively in media interviews. They understand our long tradition of Catholic social justice teaching in a way that the school’s leaders and church leaders do not. We are called to create a church that is a haven and advocate for persecuted sexual minorities, and not a menace to their well-being. While we hope for church leaders to gain a more generous understanding of human sexuality, we pray that Catholics will continue to support progress toward transgender equality in employment, housing and civil rights and strive to make our churches a place of welcome for all Christians.

Jim Fitzgerald is Executive Director of Call To Action, a member of Equally Blessed, a coalition of four Catholic organizations that have spent more than 120 years working on behalf of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people and their families.

In the good old Irish tradition, I made a joke about it with a transgendered friend. “Do I call you ‘he’ or ‘she’?”

” Makes no difference, whichever you choose. Just call me, please. I like to hear from you.” was what s/he responded.

Compassion/humanitarianism, for any and all, is the only goodly/Godly way to go, humbly admitting that there is much we do not understand, Avoiding greed and need (for power over all), while avoiding shoving and instead loving, caring, giving and sharing, without exception, should be our m.o..

Seems the control nut higher ups in the RC Church, the ‘only pew filling women, dammit’ rulers, neglect Christ’s love and care for all orders. Sad.

immigrant1

As always you misrepresent the Catholic Churches standing on equal rights. I pray for you as you and others try to misinform the public.

Our Father who art in Heaven, hollowed be Thy name, Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us and lead us not into TEMPTATIONS but deliver us from evil. Glory be to the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. AMEN

Secular1

What have you contributed to the dialogue here? You just mad a claim that your beloved church is being misrepresnted. You have not substantiated why you think so. So it is useles yo us. No one cares that some anonymous person dis agrees with the author. That pryer of yours makes me puke. It is lame crap that has been suffered by many while growing up. We dont need it.

PhillyJimi1

immigrant1 that was a really lame reply. If you’re going to defend your cult you need to be a better solider then that.

lepidopteryx

You obviously don’t actually know any transgender people, or you would not spew such nonsense.

I have dear friends who have transitioned – one male to female and another female to male. Neither is mentally ill, and neither wants to invade anyone else’s private space.

ayn123

The Catholic Church would rather have pedophile priests than allow women to be priests. That says it all.

SODDI

You don’t need faith. You do need to recognize what’s true.

Gay men and women are our fellow citizens, no matter what some foreign church says. They deserve to be treated as every other citizen is treated.